Rothfuss’ students don’t know he’s a legend

Patrick Rothfuss

Most of fantasy author Patrick Rothfuss‘s students don’t know he’s the most important fantasy author to make a debut in the past few years, according to Rothfuss himself.

The author — who wowsered the fantasy literature community with his 2007 book The Name of the Wind — is currently finalising the much-anticipated next book in the series, entitled The Wise Man’s Fear.

It is likely not an exaggeration to say that almost every fantasy book fan in the known universe is waiting with bated breath for Rothfuss to finish the book, as is chronicled in this hilarious comic strip Rothfuss posted on his blog.

Rothfuss’s normal job is teaching English at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point in Wisconsin in the United States of America. But according to a new, wide-ranging interview with the author, published by Spanish site FantasyMundo, his students are unaware of his celebrity status.

“Some of my students know,” says Rothfuss. “Occasionally one brings a book up for me to sign after class. But most of them don’t know who I am, or care. It would be different if I was teaching creative writing classes. But, alas, I’m not.”

Commentary
Hilarious stuff!

Having Patrick Rothfuss as your English teacher and not knowing about it would be like having Joss Whedon as your film studies tutor and not knowing that he was the creator of the legendary Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Dollhouse TV series and more.

However, Rothfuss is right; many university students remain completely oblivious to the background of the lecturers who are teaching them. I studied English at the University of Sydney, and we had a few celebrity lecturers who were known for other things than simply because they taught Postmodernism 1A.

But most of our classes had no idea. In fact, most of the students in my classes had no great interest in studying English at all. The few that did mostly turned out to be writers or journalists of some description, or at least fanatical readers.

Many of us science fiction and fantasy fans spend hours at work or in meeting dreaming about what we’re going to read next. I’m sure many of Rothfuss’s students spend their time daydreaming of anything but that; while one of the masters of modern fantasy sits right in front of them.

Ah, the irony.